Editor's Choice
What were the social impacts of colonization on Africa?
Quick answer:
The social impacts of colonization on Africa included the end of slavery, decline of tribal elites, and some infrastructure development. Colonizers exploited local populations, replaced diverse agriculture with monoculture, and introduced Christianity and limited education. This exploitation disrupted traditional life, causing cultural displacement and resistance. Distrust among tribes grew, and post-independence, many African nations faced governance struggles, corruption, and resource depletion.
In the late 19th century, Europeans attempted to justify their colonial conquests in Africa by defining their objectives as Christianity, commerce, and civilization (the "three C formula"). In practice, the coming of colonial administrations typically meant the end of slavery and the slave trade (with the exception of the horrible genocidal system of King Leopold II’s Congo Free State), a decline in the influence of tribal elites, and in some places, the building of some basic modern infrastructure, such as roads, telegraph lines, and railroads. In a few places that were deemed appropriate for European colonization, such as parts of East Africa (e.g., contemporary Kenya), white farmers established settlements using cheap local African labor.
With the exception of a few colonies, such as the Gold Coast (Ghana) and South Africa, the colonial rulers made little effort to industrialize the African societies that they were colonizing. On the contrary, they usually...
Unlock This Answer Now
Start your 48-hour free trial and get ahead in class. Boost your grades with access to expert answers and top-tier study guides. Thousands of students are already mastering their assignments—don't miss out. Cancel anytime.
Already a member? Log in here.
sought to develop the colonies as suppliers of raw materials and to encourage the colonial population to buy products from European industries.
In some places, the colonists replaced a diversified agricultural system with an export-oriented monoculture. Western Christian missionaries established churches and missions promoting the Christianization of colonial societies. Some rudiments of modern education and health services emerged here and there; these were accessible mostly to the upper classes of the colonial population.
The colonizers often exploited and abused the local populations brutally. This exploitation and abuse combined with the effects of modernization to undermine traditional ways of life and compromise the framework of social ties. This, in turn, led to growing anxieties and cultural displacement, which sometimes resulted in epidemics of witch hunting. At the same time, conscious resistance grew, including outright armed rebellions against colonial authorities.
The colonizers embraced the corrupt local elites as tools of their policy. The colonial rulers typically claimed racial and cultural superiority and strived (sometimes successfully) to indoctrinate the local African elites with these ideas. At the same time, a new generation of African intellectuals, such as Leopold Sedar Senghor in Senegal, embraced the ideas of human rights and nationalism, which they used to conceptualize their struggle for independence from colonial powers.
Tribes started to distrust one another since certain cheifs were bribed by the Europeans to capture enemy tribesmen. Also many men were taken as slaves more so than women so that created a unbalance society. Long term once countries in Africa became independent there were struggles with governing since for generations they were under European rule. Today we see many nations that have recently declared independence going through corrupt governments, warlords, genocide, poverty, etc. The biggest "rape" of Africa is the over-using of resources, and stripping Africa of all its valuable sources to a point were there is hardly anything left.
There is a great answer to a similar question pasted in below. One of the most powerful changes that is pointed out, has to do with the changes in governmental structure that created legacies of ineptitude and even something called "kleptocracy," that became far too common on the African continent.
The way that the imperialist powers came in and superseded the natural progression of tribal cooperation and even at times tribal conflicts, created a situation where everyone quickly found it more profitable to ally themselves with the most powerful people in any situation, regardless of their trustworthiness or their ability to produce positive effects for the society, etc. This has been a constant factor in much of the horrible governance and the constant coups and other problems that have become a fixture in much of sub-saharan Africa.